Worth a Shot
by Jak Pickens
Summary: While scavenging for food in the Dark Zone, Bruce comes across a certain box of cereal that he and a feline friend quite enjoyed as children, and maybe, just maybe, he can use something as silly as a children's cereal to reconnect with her. (5x06) (Night-of-Episode-Oneshot) (Sorry for the crappy summary, I'm usually better at them)


**A/N: I just gotta say, Robin and Camren absolutely **_**kill it **_**together. Also, Bruce becoming more Batman-like is always a plus. But yeah, overall a solid episode, minus the 'twist' of Barbara being pregnant (which I think we all totally saw coming, especially since Lee was coming back). It took me about halfway through the episode before I came up with a BatCat-centric idea for a Night-of-Episode-Oneshot, but I think this is gonna be a good one. Hope you enjoy!**

**Worth a Shot**

Bruce descended to street level as quickly and silently as possible. He was five or so miles outside the Green Zone, and there was an hour at the max until sunset. He had to be careful. Scarecrow's territory wasn't the worst part of Gotham, but it was up there.

His footsteps rang through the eerily abandoned streets.

He knew that not many people still lived out here, especially since Scarecrow's gang ran wild, but the dead silence of the city was just…wrong.

This wasn't his city. This street should've been bustling with activity, kids playing in the park across the street, cabbies fighting each other to catch pedestrians on their way home from work, the usual chaos of a big city.

But this wasn't that city, not anymore.

That city had been blown to hell along with the bridges.

He turned left down the next street, trying to stay along the edge of Scarecrow's territory. Luckily, his destination was caught in between Scarecrow's and Barbara's territory, a sort of No Man's Land.

Food was low in the Green Zone, lower than it ever had been. And now they had to feed dozens of soldiers, as well as their original group?

He'd been going out to scavenge for a couple of days, and to some success. In between territories, gangs were too scared of offending their neighbors to ransack certain former stores and supermarkets.

The small store in question, however, had been raided two days after the bridges blew. He knew it was mostly empty, but the key word there was 'mostly'. He had hope.

He stepped through the shattered glass doorframes, keeping his footsteps quiet as humanly possible. The first two rows of shelves were completely empty, so he headed towards the back of the store.

His heart lifted up at the sight: four cans of kidney beans, three cans of corn, a large bag of pretzels, some cookies (which were probably expired, but still), and a box of cereal.

He loaded up his backpack with the food, but stopped when he took the box of cereal.

He stared at the name and smiled slowly.

Cocoa Nuts.

It'd been a while.

He shook his head and laughed, an odd mix of happiness and nostalgia washing over him.

He'd had a bowl of Cocoa Nuts every morning from age four to…well…he didn't know when he'd stopped.

He'd had to have been older than thirteen, since he'd introduced them to…

He smiled again and chuckled softly.

He'd introduced them to Selina, back when she'd lived with them at the Manor, all those years ago…

She'd gotten obsessed with them.

Things had been so much simpler back then, both in their lives and in their relationship. How things had changed.

It was almost funny. Back then, he'd lost everything he cared about, and, because of it, had gained everything he cared about now.

He stared at the box for a few more moments. Then, a light bulb went off in his head.

He had an idea.

Granted, it was a crazy one, but it was at least worth a shot...

* * *

He made his way across town by rooftop, all the way through Barbara's turf, eventually reaching a gap between her territory and Penguin's.

He dropped onto a fire escape and entered a large, brick building through the window.

He knew where she stayed most nights, keeping an eye on her ever since the party at Barbara's. She was going down the same route he did, and he'd be damned if he let her get hurt because of it. Some nights he'd follow her home from the rooftops, as creepy as that sounded, just to make sure she arrived safely.

He knew that she was a big girl and she was more than capable of taking care of herself, which she'd made very clear to him recently, but it made him feel better to know she got home safe.

Speaking of her home and safe, it wasn't.

He heard muttering through the hollow walls, which was odd since she was the only person who lived there. When he took a step forwards, towards the room where she was staying, the floor creaked and the muttering dissipated.

Bruce stepped forwards again, causing another floorboard to creak under his weight. This time, he heard shuffling in the room, then dead quiet.

He had a pretty good idea of what was happening.

He cracked his neck and knuckles and rolled up his sleeves.

This was gonna be fun.

He walked forwards, kicking the door open from the outside. It creaked and groaned as it swung into the room, slamming against the wall and coming to a stop.

The sun had almost entirely set, and it was nearly pitch black in the building.

Which meant that whoever was inside couldn't see him. But he could see them.

Before entering the room, he lowered his voice and called into it, "Before we get started, does anyone wanna get out?"

No response.

Bruce smirked. "Alright then."

He stepped into the room and immediately deflected a machete aimed at his skull. He elbowed the first attacker in the face, then moved to the second and third, foolishly standing right next to each other. At least it made Bruce's job easier. He lunged at them, grabbed them by their throats, and chokeslammed them to the ground. An arm grabbed him roughly by the shoulder. Bruce took the hand, bent it in a way that hands weren't made to be bent, and then judo threw the man onto the other two on the floor.

Then, a gun clocked back and he felt a pressure dig into the back of his head.

He slowly raised his hands in surrender.

There was a loud _CRACK!_ and the pressure was gone, the man now lying face down on the floor, groaning in pain and holding his nose with a cord wrapped around his ankle.

Bruce turned to the doorway and grinned. "Hey, Selina."

Without offering so much as a glance at the man, he kicked him in the head with his heel, knocking him out.

Selina shook her head. "What are you doing here?" she asked, seeming annoyed at him. As if the whole thing had been his fault.

Bruce shrugged. "You know, I was in the neighborhood, figured I'd drop by."

"And why would you do that?" she asked pointedly, flipping on the light switch and slumping into one of the chairs at her small kitchen table.

Bruce reached into his backpack, removing the box of cereal. "I was out scavenging tonight. I found this and thought of you." He smirked at her shocked reaction and shook the box. "You interested?" he teased, knowing that she was very much interested. She picked up on his teasing tone narrowed her eyes. He held up his hands in surrender and told her, "Hey, if you don't want any then I can just leave…"

"No!" she interrupted, probably louder than she'd intended. She cleared her throat and told him, "Thank you, Bruce. I appreciate the gift."

He gave her a funny look, saying, "It's not a gift." He turned to her sink and pulled out a pair of bowls, drying them off and starting to fill them with cereal. Over his shoulder, he told her, "You're not the only one who loves Cocoa Nuts." He poured in the milk, which she always had a stock of, and said, "After all, I was the one who introduced you when we were kids."

He turned back to her with two bowls of cereal, catching her mid-eye roll. Still, she took the bowl gladly, offering a small 'thank you' before digging in.

After a few minutes of silence between them, Bruce asked, "So, how are you doing?"

She glanced up at him for the first time since receiving the bowl, a judgmental eyebrow cocked. He didn't back down or backtrack. She rolled her eyes and returned to her bowl, responding, "Not too great. As you can see, nobody's like these guys," she said, gesturing to the five unconscious men lying on the floor of her temporary house, "keep trying to take shots at me. Make a name for themselves or whatever."

Bruce nodded understandingly. "That sucks."

She shook her head. "You have no idea. I can't even walk down the street anymore without some bozo trying to kill me."

Bruce scoffed. "Welcome to my world," he joked. She chuckled and he told her, "I kinda feel bad for people like them." She raised a questioning eyebrow and he elaborated, "They have no idea who they're messing with."

She blinked, as if taken off guard by his comment. She narrowed her eyes and asked, "Was that a compliment?"

He shrugged. "All I'm saying is that I can relate to these guys," he said, kicking one of their legs offhandedly. He stood from the table, having finished his bowl, and turned back to the sink, saying, "I should know. I have firsthand experience, after all."

For the first time in a long time, Bruce had her completely bewildered. As she stared at his back, her mind was trying to pick apart his past couple of sentences. First he'd kind of complimented her, then he'd made the comment about 'firsthand experience dealing with her'… Was he throwing shade or just being the socially-inept Bruce Wayne that she'd known for years?

He finished washing his bowl in the sink and turned back to her, checking his watch. "I should get going," he told her. "It's getting late."

She nodded slowly, still trying to figure out his motives behind the visit. He could've come by anytime, so why now?

"Yeah, you should," she agreed. "It was good to see you, and thanks for the cereal," she told him slowly and deliberately, choosing her words very wisely.

He nodded and turned to the five unconscious dudes on her apartment floor. "You want me to get rid of these guys?" he asked.

She shook her head, replying, "No, I got another pad I'm gonna stay at tonight. Clearly, too many people know about this one," she said, eyeing him pointedly.

He smirked and nodded. "Well, goodnight, Cat. Stay safe."

And with that he whisked out of her temporary apartment, leaving the box of cereal behind.

She shook her head and chuckled to herself. "Right, safe," she muttered. "Sure thing."

She packed up her stuff into a duffel bag, saving just enough space to fit the box of cereal into, and moved across town to a new location she'd been scouting.

* * *

The next morning, she pulled out a bowl, milk, and the box cereal.

She went to pour it, but something else fell out among the flaky, delicious goodness that were Cocoa Nuts. Something small and metallic.

She picked the object out and stared at it for a few moments.

When she overcame her surprise and figured out what it was, she'd never scoffed harder.

Only Bruce Wayne would go through all of that just to give her a key to his apartment.

She rolled her eyes, but slipped it safely into her pocket nonetheless.

Maybe she'd end up using it…someday.

**A/N: Yes. I wrote an entire story based off of a box of cereal. These are the straws I'm grasping at. Gotham writers, if you're out there, this is what you've driven me to. I hope you're happy. But jokes aside, the original concept was for Bruce to just happen to run across Selina getting jumped by a gang of thugs, and Bruce stepping in to help her out, but I saw Camren's post on Instagram (which you should totally follow me on jakpickens_writing) about the box of cereal and the rest is history. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed, and if you did or have any comments/questions/critiques, please make sure to review! Your feedback is what I write for, after all. Thanks for reading and ciao for now!**

**Oh, and to my **_**Roles Revered**_** readers, the new chapter may or may not be coming out on Sunday. I try to always upload on Saturdays or Sundays, but I have a big thing this weekend so I will try and post it but I just might not be able to. Also, make sure to keep an eye out for my new series, **_**The Escapades of Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle**_**, coming very, very soon.**


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